@indie1337@vivaldi.net @CharismaticBatman The Chosen is pretty good; we're in the 3rd season. I was reading in Mark this week about "The Good News must first be preached to all the nations." and thinking that perhaps there are nations and peoples that don't even exist yet in that list. We just don't know how many sheep Jesus has.
It has become one of my favorite religious-themed shows of all time, probably the #1.
Now that you mention the great commission, an angle of argument I hadn't quite thought through is that of the Church's delay, rather than the Lord's. Our delay and dragging our feet in actually doing the work of the Gospel -- no only in preaching to every people group, but actually living up to what the Gospel is -- which is a total head rush once you think about it for about ten seconds ;)
So... did we cause the delay, then??
@CharismaticBatman @indie1337@vivaldi.net
Causality, even on a "simple" quantum level is impossible to wrap one's head around. When you think about God's sovereignty, predestination, prophecy, free will, etc, about the only right responses are, "Yes, these are real, and I am not able to understand them." and awe. I'm guilty in getting caught up in all of that puzzlement instead of just doing the Great Commission.
@daniel @indie1337
Right. I actually think that a lot of what's taught about prophecy (both in the past and present tense) is actually pretty harmful, sadly.
Past tense: People read prophecy like they're reading something purely historical, don't make heads or tails of it (naturally), and then hear some preacher get up with false certainty preaching a particular interpretation of the prophecy as if it's an absolute truth, and people eat it up, because they have zero capacity for the vagaries and imagery of actual prophecy. Therefore, as Althusser might say (if he were a Christian, instead of sadly very much dead), "The doctrine of the preacher gives the listener a false sense of connectedness and understanding of the word, all the while filling their head with mostly nonsense and making them incapable of pondering, puzzling, and seeking understanding from the Lord on what the text actually says." These things are meant to be meditated on, prayed about, and even trembled over for decades. And people can't stand to spend more than an hour thinking about anything. Goodness me.
On the flip side, many godly theologians have puzzled over biblical prophecy and have done their best to help people understand it, but the quest for certainty is almost always an enormous detour into falsehoods.
Pertaining to prophesy in the present tense, most churches are either cessationist (proclaiming [quite falsely, IMHO] that the gifts of the Spirit ceased at the end of the first century), or they're so utterly loosey-goosey in their approach to the prophetic gift, that they have people spitballing utterly insane and demonstrably false things (if not utter idolatry and error) from the pulpits.
Paul and John's words are incredibly helpful: Prophecy is for "edification, exhortation and comfort," and "the spirit of prophecy is the testimony of Jesus."
It's words of edification, wisdom, and comfort, revealing the heart of the Father, for the sake of the hearer.